A little insight from someone who has been in the patent trenches, and
understands the wars:

First, remember that a patent is like a banner, telling the entire world the
central, most important parts of your invention, all must be revealed, and
nothing remains hidden.

NOTHING prevents someone from looking up your patent, and copying exactly
what you are doing.  (Except of course that it is illegal, and for many
people, this is a detail)

It is your responsibility to PROVE that they are violating your patent, and
this can take years, and a lot of money.  Patents have been called the "Full
Employment Contract for the legal community", and this is especially the case
in the US.

All of the above starts to make the concept of a trade secret much more
appealing, UNLESS it is immediately obvious by looking at the finished
product that your patent is being violated.  If your patent is simply a
better way to arrive at the same product, you are probably better off keeping
it a trade secret.

Lastly, remember, the patent offices are staffed by people who cannot/do not
want to be in the highly competitive commercial world, and the law is so
arcane, and archaic, that it is years behind the rest of the world.  My
company has abandoned patent applications simply because we could not get the
patent office to understand the concept of what we are patenting.

Very obvious things have been patented.  We have been sued over things that
we thought were so obvious that they could not be patented.   In some cases
two patents have been issued for essentially the same idea.  The patent
office is not full of the brightest lights in the world, and NOBODY ever got
fired from the government for being dumb.

Rudy Sedlak
RD Chemical Company

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